Trying to predict the outcome of the NFL season in May is madness -- teams haven’t even held their first formal practices of the new campaign, after all. It’s much safer, though, to forecast that the division champions won’t look the same as they did last season.
At least one team has won its division the season after missing the playoffs entirely in 53 of the 55 seasons since the AFL-NFL merger in 1970. Only 2024 and 1976 had division winners that were all in the postseason the prior campaign. Parity is usually such a powerful force in the NFL that at least one team has gone from worst to first -- winning the division the season after finishing last or tied for last -- in 20 of the last 23 years. No team did it in 2024, and that was the first time since 2019.
Last season, we had two new division winners. The eventual Super Bowl champion Philadelphia Eagles unseated the Dallas Cowboys in the NFC East, while the Los Angeles Rams won the NFC West, taking the crown from the San Francisco 49ers, who plummeted all the way to the bottom of the division. Parity took the 2024 season off in the AFC -- all four division champions were repeats.
It's time for us to take a look at who might be vulnerable this season. I’m not officially predicting that the higher-ranked teams below will lose their divisions, but I am forecasting that the landscape might have changed just enough -- for them and their division opponents -- that their future could be a little murky. This is not to say that those squads that fail to repeat as division champions inherently will fail to make the postseason altogether. With three wild-card spots in each conference, there is room for error.
Based on offseason roster activity, though, this is an ordering, 1-8, of the teams whose grasp on the division title might be loosened in 2025. Without further ado, the most vulnerable reigning division champ is ...
The NFC North came down to the final game of the 2024 regular season. There’s no reason to think the division, which just sent three teams to the playoffs, won’t be as ferocious in 2025, particularly with the anticipated improvement of the Bears, who are coming off a last-place finish. The Vikings are making a switch at quarterback, but how do you bet against Kevin O’Connell making the right choice and having J.J. McCarthy ready, especially after Minnesota did so much to fortify the interior of the offensive line, the team’s biggest weakness in 2024? The Packers gave Jordan Love a first-round wide receiver, while the Bears have done everything possible to make life better for Caleb Williams, from hiring Ben Johnson as head coach to overhauling the interior O-line to spending their first two draft picks on TE Colston Loveland and WR Luther Burden III. All of that makes for a whole lot of competition for the Lions, who are still flush with talent, but must adjust to two new coordinators after Johnson and Aaron Glenn got head-coaching jobs. Even if that process turns out to be seamless, it’s easy to envision the division again coming down to the final week.
Here’s another ranking that is a reflection of the competition. The Ravens have won the AFC North two seasons in a row, have a quarterback who could be the league MVP every year and have no apparent roster holes. But the Steelers and Bengals are in the division and they could threaten the Ravens if a) Aaron Rodgers decides to sign with Pittsburgh and b) Joe Burrow is in one piece and Cincinnati can finally avoid a slow start. Rodgers is the biggest wild card here. He showed just enough late last season with the Jets to convince the Steelers he could put them over the top, particularly with the addition of DK Metcalf to the receiver room. The Bengals’ sluggish Septembers have largely been a function of Burrow injury recoveries and, in some cases, contract dilemmas that lingered into late summer. If Cincinnati can avoid those, the team has plenty of firepower to compete. It wouldn’t be a surprise to see three squads from this division make the playoffs, and it wouldn’t be a surprise if any one of the three wins the division.
It’s been more than two decades since the NFC East had a repeat winner (the Eagles held the title from 2001 through 2004), and Philadelphia could be in a dogfight to hold on to the crown again this season. The Commanders are a team on a very rapid rise, and whatever unsteadiness Jayden Daniels showed in his rookie season should be improved in 2025, especially because he will be behind an improved offensive line and have Deebo Samuel to target in addition to Terry McLaurin. Eagles general manager Howie Roseman conducts a clinic in roster replenishment, but he did lose plenty of big-name talent on defense. Philadelphia had one of the most balanced rosters in the NFL last season, and the team still has an extraordinary cast of offensive weapons. This place in the ranking is a reflection not of any thought that the Eagles will take a significant step back -- they almost certainly won’t, barring injury disasters to Jalen Hurts and Saquon Barkley -- but of their current reality. They have an in-division rival who is coming on strong and NFL history is on the side of a change at the top.
Los Angeles won the NFC West by the slimmest of margins last season -- it came down to the strength of victory tiebreaker over Seattle. And while I love the decisions to keep Matthew Stafford and sign Davante Adams, the biggest thing going for the Rams right now is we don’t know what to expect from the rest of the division. The Seahawks had a strong first season under coach Mike Macdonald, but they made the switch at quarterback from Geno Smith to Sam Darnold this offseason, and it’s anybody’s guess if Darnold can replicate the success he found with Kevin O’Connell and the Vikings’ weapons in 2024. The 49ers appear to be in a reset period, enduring an exodus of key players like LB Dre Greenlaw in advance of handing QB Brock Purdy a huge contract extension. The Cardinals’ defense should be improved with notable additions like free-agent signee Josh Sweat and first-round pick Walter Nolen, and if Marvin Harrison Jr. makes a big second-year leap, Arizona could push for a playoff spot. Still, the Rams were far ahead of schedule in 2024 and surged in the second half of the season. That could give them more of a cushion in the division in 2025.
The Texans had a hideous offensive line and a brutal string of wide receiver injuries, leading to a C.J. Stroud sophomore slump -- yet Houston still won the AFC South by multiple games. On paper, the competition is improved, but that’s on paper. The Jaguars drafted the single most exciting player in the game in two-way star Travis Hunter, but Liam Coen is a rookie head coach, so we know nothing of his game management. The Colts brought in Daniel Jones to compete with Anthony Richardson, and the hope is that it brings out the best in both quarterbacks. Lastly, the Titans have the top overall draft pick in QB Cam Ward. The Texans rejiggered their offensive line -- if it jells, continuity is likely to be the team’s friend in the division.
Confession: Last May in this space, I listed the Bucs as the co-most vulnerable division champ. Every year, I make the mistake of thinking Tampa Bay is vulnerable just because the NFC South is so underwhelming. And every year for the past four, the Bucs have prevailed. Why might that change in 2025? Well, quarterback Michael Penix Jr. gave the Falcons a spark when he took over the job last season and he is the entrenched starter now. And Atlanta finally addressed its pass rush in the draft. Bryce Young looked greatly improved after his benching last season in Carolina and he has a pretty nice receiving corps now. The Saints are in for a post-Derek Carr reset, but the Falcons and Panthers could give the Bucs a real push in the division race. Still, Baker Mayfield is clearly the best quarterback of the group and he will have a stellar group of receivers. Continuity counts for plenty, and Tampa Bay has it. You don’t always have to be dominant to win your division, and the Bucs get the job done.
The Chiefs have won their division a staggering nine seasons in a row, and last year they won it by four games. So why are they not the least vulnerable? Well, bluntly, the other teams in the AFC West appear to be more of a challenge than the other teams in the AFC East. The Chargers and Broncos both made the playoffs last season as wild cards, Los Angeles after a significant first-year turnaround under coach Jim Harbaugh and Denver with a successful rookie season from quarterback Bo Nix. The Raiders, now with Pete Carroll and quarterback Geno Smith, should also be vastly improved. I can’t pick against a team that features Andy Reid, Steve Spagnuolo and Patrick Mahomes, though. Maybe the Chiefs will wind up with a few more losses than they had last season (two) because the division games should be much tougher. But four games is still a wide margin, and as long as Mahomes is upright, the Chiefs will cast a long shadow.
The least vulnerable division champion and, at this point, it’s not particularly close. The Bills won the division last year by five games, the largest margin in the league. The competition could be ramped up, though, at least a bit. The Patriots are likely to be vastly improved from the basement-dwellers they were last season. With Mike Vrabel taking over as head coach, New England underwent a makeover on both sides of the line and added offensive weapons. The Jets are starting a new era with Aaron Glenn and Justin Fields, but New York finished eight games behind Buffalo in 2024 -- that's an awful lot of ground to make up. For a few years, the Dolphins had entered the season appearing to be the greatest threat to the Bills -- post-Tom Brady stranglehold on the AFC East -- but that fervor has passed with each successive miss and, especially, this offseason’s lack of moves to better the roster. Most of all, the Bills have the league’s reigning MVP and they just spent the draft drilling down on defense.